Early Uproar Over '25 To Life' Separates Game From Gang-War Pack

[Stone Cold is Bout It, Bout It]

Last week, "25 to Life" was just another upcoming video game in the growing virtual-gang-warfare genre popular on Xbox and PlayStation 2. It may have been easily confused with "Fear and Respect," "187: Ride or Die," "Crime Life," "Saint's Row,"

"Bulletproof" and "True Crime" — which are all due in a store near you by the end of the year.

When United States Senator Charles Schumer (D-New York) denounced "25 to Life" on Sunday — saying it hit an "all-time low" and calling on New York retailers to not stock the title — it suddenly stood out from the pack.

"25 to Life" allows players to control a troubled gangster or "good cop" while gunning down enemy cops and gang members. An online mode allows players to go head-to-head in a 16-person bout of digital cops-and-robbers.

"Little Johnny should be learning how to read, not how to kill cops," Schumer said. The game "makes 'Grand Theft Auto' look like 'Romper Room,' " the senator added in a statement to Reuters.

Uproar over violent games tends to follow their release, not the other way around. Haitian community leaders, for example, made headlines protesting depictions of Haitians in "Grand Theft Auto: Vice City" several months after the game hit stores as an instant best seller.

So what made "25 to Life" stand out from the herd of bloody cops-and-gangs titles? The game first caught the attention of a group of assistant district attorneys working gang units in late 2004. That's when "25 to Life" was originally set for release from Eidos, the British-based publisher also responsible for the "Tomb Raider" series. The game was delayed until 2005, by which time it had caught the attention of an assistant district attorney working the gang detail in New York's Richmond County (Staten Island). "When we saw the nature of what was on there and how repugnant it is, we knew we had to do something," said William Smith, a spokesperson for the district attorney's office.

Smith explained that his office is familiar with many violent video games, but that this one hit close to home. He cited a community concern for cops that was heightened by the execution-style murders of two officers in 2003. "We don't find any redeeming characteristics [in a game] where you can go and shoot at cops," he said. To make matters worse, he said, "25 to Life" made a game of choosing gang colors and — by including a hip-hop soundtrack containing songs from Xzibit, Tupac Shakur and DMX — seemed to be marketed to a youth audience.

The game will be rated "M" by the Entertainment Software Ratings Board, indicating that it should be sold only to players over 17, but Smith said he wasn't even happy about the game being sold to adults. "When you go to a movie theater you can control who's going in. What's to stop a 25-year-old from buying this game and giving it to his 9-year-old relative?"

In recent months, politicians across the country have sounded off against violent video games. In late May, the Illinois state legislature approved a bill that would ban the sale of "violent" and "sexually explicit" video games to minors. In California and Washington, D.C., local politicians have called for content regulations on the gaming industry. In March, Schumer's fellow U.S. senator from New York, Hilary Rodham Clinton, came out against "Grand Theft Auto."

Despite the increasing volume of concerns, the video-game industry has been largely quiet in public. Calls to Eidos and "25 to Life" developers Highway 1 Productions and Avalanche Software were not returned by press time.

Michael Pachter, an analyst who covers the gaming industry for Wedbush Morgan Securities, said he expects consumers will choose not to pick up "25 to Life" regardless of Senator Schumer's concern.

"This game is not going to do very well," Pachter predicted. "The people that video games appeal to are not cop killers." He cited another envelope-pushing crime game — "Narc" — that failed to connect with consumers and observed that in "Grand Theft Auto," players are encouraged to actually steer clear of the police.

Pachter added that, from what he has seen of it, he doesn't expect "25 to Life" to be very good, and believes the title could somewhat benefit from the political spotlight. Without it, said Pachter, "I think the game would have kind of just passed under the radar and nobody would have cared."

— Stephen Totilo

http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1504541/20050622/index.jhtml?headlines=true